AS the culling fields await their sacrificial bath of badger blood how much is really known to justify such a drastic course of action?

Bovine TB is a disease endemic to bovine animals, as the name suggests, and has been for centuries. Any attempt to re-classify it as badger TB is delusional propaganda, worthy of Dr Goebbels.

The disease was first discovered in a badger during the early 1970s at Cirencester. It spread quickly amongst badgers because they had no resistance to it, just as the indigenous Americans fell foul of measles brought to them by Europeans. How and why did this 'beast of Cirencester' succumb?

This is a key question still awaiting an answer. It lies within our knowledge of disease transmission and development. So what do we know and how does this affect our understanding of unfolding events?

Are there proven transmission routes from badgers to cattle? No. Is there a set of viable hypotheses for these? Perhaps, but they remain untested. It is sufficient for worldwide 'evidence' to be used in justification of a cull. Only in the case of the white tailed deer in Michigan can it be demonstrated that the animals were having opportunities to share feeding trays with cattle and exchange fluids (saliva).

Here again the cattle were sending the disease to the wildlife population, which then recycled it. A white deer cull and good animal husbandry eliminated the problem.

Matters are not so clear cut here, so whilst it is possible a cull of badgers may reduce the incidence of TB in cattle no one knows why. It is certain that a large percentage of culled badgers will not have any signs of the disease as over the past 40 years they have had the opportunity to develop immunity to it. It is significant that none of the culled animals will be subject to post mortem examinations, so we will never know.

It remains the case that cattle are the most prominent and known transmitters of TB. Other means of transmission need to be properly considered, such as ticks, fleas and an assortment of fomites with which cattle may come into contact.

The fact remains that no established, direct transmission route from badgers to cattle exists.

Research is needed to ensure that deeply dividing decisions are properly informed, if they are to gain widespread acceptance.

Albert Weager,

Coalway